40 acres of caliche, ancient ash, sandstone, shale, dust, pillars of rocky figures, a finest example of earth wreckage in texas there ever was. 40 ain’t a lot out here.
here i plant with care each of the virtues men have told me they see in me - mysterious, wild, exhibitionist, warm, mommy, prude, tender, comfortable, and some others i can’t name. each comes in a little packet with descriptions and advice for their growth and cultivation. i read somewhere that you can hear rhubarb grow if you deprive it of light - the roots will rub and pop it grows so fast. i put my ear to the ground to each of the virtues. i listen to what they tell me, i talk back, i read the backs of the seed packets for advice. most do best two weeks after the last freeze, but we still have a ways to go until then. i just want to see what will come of them. packets advise to expect variety.
my friend tells me i need to be patient. i tell her i’m running out of days & i’m in no shape to be cultivated.
things work on their own time out here, but the virtue sprouts do emerge.
‘every burning house is a woman’, i read somewhere once. the sun is long gone so i watch the lighted billows of eternities above, and bend over backward tracing them. i figure that’s where i began, somewhere between that shining dot and the duller one there. i keep following and bending with them until all i want to do is sleep. i fall asleep somewhere between the virtue seedlings tender and wild. i dream often about snakes and floods, but in these dreams there’s just warmth and stillness. things are clearer down here in the dirt. the virtues hum and chant underground while i dream. i wake up and i’m on fire; heat and pressure bowing outwards from the stars dripped down. everything living is on fire and the sprouting virtues smolder down to nothing.
i’m not good at articulating what i want but i know how sticky wanting is. everything living is still on fire around the 40 acres. complete combustion is one part warm empty air and one part the stars’ leaky heat. the seedling virtues are ash, mixed in the ancient ash of the place.
, 7., 8., 9. below the ground the roots of the little virtues are humming still. i keep my ear pressed to the ground. my patience and care have paid off. the dust is here to stay and i’m still burning.
1. Impulse your small natures into a single plot
2. What feels like a list of tricks might just be who you are.
3. The garden only grows what the soil bears.
4. Sparks from the burning home, form eternal constellations.
5. Make demands of possibility.
6. Expand what seems into a ladder made of pages.
7. Grow loose. Grow comprehensive.
8. Grow routes your mind would never grow.
9. Ask the flames to address you in one last furtive caress.
thank you to Mathias Svalina for the prompt, and thank you karma.